Critical Pedagogy and Empowering Education
“A curriculum designed to empower students must be transformative in nature and help students develop the knowledge, skills, and values needed to become social critics who can make reflective decisions and implement their decisions in effective personal, social, political, and economic action” (Banks qtd. in Shor 16).
This week’s readings on Critical Pedagogy from Paulo Freire and Ira Shor really resonated with me, especially after being unsettled by the “unpolitical” approach to classroom teaching that we discussed last week. Shor challenges the concept of a politically neutral classroom, arguing that classrooms that don’t engage with questioning the world prevent students from developing the critical thinking skills that enable action. As a result, these classrooms seemingly align themselves with dominant social structures, clinging to the “status quo.”
Similarly, in “The “Banking Concept” of Education” Freire discusses a “problem-posing education” that reinforces the transformative nature of learning. As Freire states: “The unfinished character of human beings and the transformational character of reality necessitate that education be an ongoing activity” (Freire 10). Importantly, as Freire discusses, “problem-posing education” does not rely on the dichotomy of teacher and student, but rather teachers and students are reframed as “co-investigators” who have conversations, work together, and solve problems.
A few of the main classroom takeaways that I had from this approach to teaching writing were:
- Allow students to have a say in developing curriculum by using student themes
- Create authentic assignments that have the potential to create change outside the classroom
- Reframe classroom power dynamics by allowing students and teachers to jointly act as “co-investigators"
- Pose problems to engage students both as writers and citizens
What do you guys think? What potential problems or challenges does this approach present? Do you do something similar to what Freire and Shor describe in your classrooms already?
I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
Taylor,
ReplyDeleteThe reading this week definitely made me reframe my thinking in terms of myself as a teacher and as a student. I've thought more about how I can change my mindset from being experienced and knowledgeable enough to bestow information on my students, to considering how I can include them in the process and help them to think critically, with no one "best" approach.
I really like your thought about creating authentic assignments that have potential to create change outside the classroom--I'd love to hear more about that. I often struggle to apply theoretical concepts and ideas practically in the classroom.
I do love the idea of creating more opportunities to learn together with students. That's something I definitely want to focus on in my class. I want to find more ways to engage them in thinking critically about current issues and to embark on discussions about those issues together. That's something I'm still thinking about implementing but haven't put into play much.
Please let me know if you think of some concrete ways you're thinking about applying these ideas in your class! I'd love to share ideas!
Taylor,
ReplyDeleteI think the biggest challenge to this approach is the students themselves. Now, I'm Mr. Expressivist who would prefer no teachers whatsoever, but even there we have to consider the limited perspectives that students bring into the classroom, not just molded by society at large but by the classrooms in which they have spent a good portion of the last 12 or so years of their lives.
Shor presents an optimistic picture of student engagement, but what happens when there isn't the common enemy of a composition exam, or maybe you have a classroom of "C's get degrees" students who want to sit there and regurgitate enough lecture material to move on to the next thing?
Maybe they're indoctrinated into the banking concept of education. Or, maybe all they truly want out of a college education is a diploma. We may not agree with that goal, but who are we enforce a certain idea of education onto our students?
As for concrete examples, given that we as a class seem to agree that grading is one of the great barriers to this sort of educational model, maybe consider involving your students in the grading process. Maybe they have to assign a grade to their own work, or even assign a grade to the work of other students. On one hand, this possibly gets to Freire's postmodern ideals of getting the students to think about the artificial structure of grading (and heck, we'll throw in Arendtian labor as well), but it also gives them a chance to be involved in a ubiquitous aspect of the classroom.
My mentor did a little something in this vein last year, and she's fairly traditional as far as how she runs her classroom. During group presentations at the end of the semester, she had every student fill out a small form highlighting some positive aspects of each student's presentation and a suggestion or two to improve the presentation. They also had to say what grade they thought the presenter should receive. The rubric had a section for the grades the class thought should be given, so there was some tangible effect to their activities. She also included comments from the other students on the form she returned to each student. While the majority of a student's grade was decided by my mentor, including the students in the process in this manner does seem to break down some of the power dynamics at work in a traditional classroom.
-Lucas
My biggest struggle with incorporating these ideas this semester (letting the students help me make the syllabus, focusing on them and their learning and letting them engage in different degrees for their various needs) has been getting them to care. When students take 104, they often conceptualize it as a box that they want to check off and they just need to memorize some things and go. This is probably some fault of my own in presentation but it's also disheartening to see that not very many of my students appreciate this and use it to their advantage and authentically want to engage in the assignment and the classroom.
ReplyDeleteI would have to agree that the content in this week’s readings struck a chord with me. I think they are my favorite readings so far this semester (especially Freire). I like that you brought in some quotes from the readings as well. I definitely agree with Freire’s comment about how education is an ongoing process. I think that this is one of the biggest things I want my students to understand (especially the fact that learning is never finished and it exists in all parts of life, not just the classroom).
ReplyDeleteI really like and support the concept of having students involved in the learning process and having some bit of say in the activities and assignments they have to complete. Yet, (and perhaps this is more of an issue in a Freshman level course) there are also some dangers to this model. Students could easily take it too far to the point where they think they can take advantage of you and get you to make their work easier. They should have some say, true, but how much is too much. I have a lengthy example to go into, but I will spare you from it for now.